Title Vii

Title VII

The Civil Rights movement in America had seen many political promises, without much action in the decade prior to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. There were Acts of Congress that slightly applied to the demands of the minority leaders and women's rights activists; the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 primarily focused on voting rights. Both Acts were signed into law by President Eisenhower.

According to Wikipedia.org, the Civil Rights Act containing discrimination protection was initially promised to the country by President John F. Kennedy in a civil rights speech in June of 1963. Kennedy brought the bill before Congress, but was not able to see it through. The year following his assassination President Lyndon Johnson saw the bill through Congress and signed it into law on July 2, 1964. (wikipedia.org, 2004) Activist Martin Luther King Jr. was among the many guests invited to witness the signing of the Act.

According to the information found on the Department of Labor website, in 1979 the duties and responsibilities of the Civil Service Commission were transferred to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC now oversees the enforcement of the Title VII laws. Any claims of harassment that are covered by Title VII, and are to be pursued legally, must be filed with the EEOC. This organization is in place to specialize in the resolution of such complaints. (www.dol.gov/oasam, 2006)

Title VII

Until 1986 sex discrimination had included affairs regarding gender, however, in the Supreme Court case Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson, 477 U.S. 57, which occurred in 1986, the court ruled that sexual harassment qualifies as sexual discrimination and is therefore protected under the umbrella of Title VII.

In 1991, a Civil Rights Act was signed by President George Bush which amended Title VII of the CRA of 1964, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as stated in the CRA of 1991 as published on the EEOC official website (www.eeoc.gov, 1997). This act was particularly geared towards strengthening the laws and protective devices originally laid out. Racial discrimination had begun to evade the court system and it the amendment was required in order to hold up the Title VII protection.

Other legal devices have been drawn up to provide protection that is similar to Title VII protections. One of which is the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. With the CRA of 1991, many cases have been able to use Title VII interchangeably with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.

Since inception, Title VII protections have significantly transformed the relationship between employer and employee. The impacts produced by the act have affected many facets of employment law. New federal, state, and local regulations were created as a result of protections from the act itself and from subsequent laws that used

Title VII

Title VII as a basis to extend different employment protections to classes not covered in the original legislation.

Two of the most significant concepts credited to Title VII's genesis are disparate impact and disparate treatment ("History of Disparate Impact Lawsuits", 2005). In disparate impact cases, illegal discrimination may be shown through statistical analysis of a group of cases "alleging that the employer's policy, while neutral on its face (facially neutral), has a disparate or adverse impact on a protected Title VII group" (Bennet-Alexander & Hartman, 2004, p. 100). Conversely, disparate treatment cases involve allegations directly attached to an individual claim of discrimination in comparison to other employees. Disparate treatment cases filed under Title VII protection must show that discrimination occurred as a member of a protected group under the act to be valid. Prior to Title VII, neither concept was widely used to bring claims of mistreatment against employers.

The introduction of Title VII in 1964 has significantly increased the number of discrimination claims filed against employers. While the actual number of complaints per year varies, today the Equal Opportunity Commission (EEOC) handles "nearly 60,000 federal suits filed annually" (Solnik, 2005, p. 10B). The act itself also remains controversial among the employment law community. Although a significant number of successfully resolved cases have demonstrated clear improvements in the spirit of the act, detractors point out that the number of actual employer violations found to have merit remains very low.

Title VII

In 2004, about 60 percent of EEOC complaints were thrown out with no reasonable cause; only about 5 percent were found to have reasonable cause; 20 percent resulted in "merit resolutions," which include negotiated settlements, out-of-court conciliations and case withdrawals with benefits; the rest resulted in administrative closures - that is, the cases were withdrawn and no ruling were passed down. (Solnik, 2005, p. 10B).

The overall impact of Title VII has changed the way employers interact with employees on a daily basis. Evidence of this impact is apparent throughout the employment relationship's entire lifetime, and affects everything from pre-employment hiring practices to post-employment information disclosure. The struggle to eliminate discriminatory hiring and employment practices has produced notable advancements for members of protected classes and improved awareness of "equal-opportunity" employment standards throughout the United States.

The following descriptions should be in a company's policy handbook:

Ð'* "Quid Pro Quo Sexual Harassment Ð'- This form of sexual harassment occurs in a person's place of employment. In this situation of sexual harassment an employer offers an employee certain benefits, such as a job advancement or raise, in exchange for sexual favors. The employer may also use sex and sexual acts as a way to threaten an employee, such as implying that if the employee does not perform the sex acts that he or she will lose their job.

Ð'* Hostile Workplace Sexual Harassment Ð'- This form of sexual harassment is when an employee is forced to work in a hostile environment due to sexual harassment

Title VII

in the workplace. Repeated lewd comments, sexist jokes, propositions, and offensive sexual stereotyping are examples of hostile workplace sexual harassment.

Ð'* Jilted Paramour Sexual Harassment Ð'-